Monster
by giraffelove92
Summary: The monstrous thing that shines from his black-brown-grey eyes reflects the monstrous thing within her. It is a connection born of darkness – born of a shared forbidden desire that steals away their self-control, piece by perishing piece. Jonsa. Smut.
1. Chapter 1

**I started this some time ago, and then I went through my funk and just sort of gave up on writing for a while. Don't worry, I already have a good chunk of the next chapter for** _ **She Rises**_ **written, and will finish that within the next few days. And** _ **How To Lose Your Dragon**_ **is still ongoing, I just need to really focus on finishing the half-written chapter.** _ **The Zone Where Black and White Clash**_ **is temporarily on hold for about two weeks, until I manage to get everything else up to date.**

 **But I already have 9 prewritten chapters for this story, so I figured I'd go ahead and give it to you already.**

 **I swore I wasn't going to ship Jon and Sansa. Apparently I don't know myself as well as I think I do. So here we go.**

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"What do you _mean,_ 'I don't get one'?"

Jon rolls his eyes as he puts away his saddle, scratching the tiny whimpering pup at his ankles behind the ears. Rickon sniggers from just inside the door of the tack room, holding his own direwolf puppy, looking at Jon with laughter in his eyes that suggests he thinks Jon will play along with the game he and his brother and sister play.

Sansa, newly turned thirteen, stands outside, looking as beautiful as ever, her long red hair twined into braids and her rose petal lips trembling. Her coltish limbs are covered in a blue dress, and his eyes catch on a cluster of faint freckles on her collarbone. Soft cyan eyes – the same color as her mother's, but with none of the sharp intelligence – fill with tears.

"There were only five of them, and Jon got the last one," Arya said with a shrug, holding two direwolf pups in her arms and watching her sister with gleeful grey eyes. "Sorry, Sansa."

Tears spill over onto Sansa's cheeks. "B-but Jon wouldn't do that!" she says, crossing her arms over her chest and looking utterly devastated in a way that only a disappointed teenage girl can manage. "He's not even a _Stark._ I _am._ He wouldn't take one for himself if all of us hadn't already gotten one!"

Jon stiffens, and sighs. _He's not even a Stark._ Sansa will always remind him of this.

He knows she does not mean to alienate him. She is never purposefully unkind to him, unless she is in a snit (and then, no one is safe). She does not have a cruel nature. But he and Sansa have never been at all close, and out of all the Stark children, she spends the most time with her mother. Sansa is not the smartest of girls, but she is intuitive enough to pick up on Lady Catelyn's distaste for Jon, and it has influenced her own relationship with her half-brother. Her insults towards him are never intentional, but they are insults nonetheless, and her lack of awareness drives a wedge between them that only gets wider as they age.

"Besides," she whines, tears streaming down her face, "how come you're carrying two?"

Bran's eyes glitter with mischief from where he stands beside Arya, holding his own male, which he's just named Summer, close to his chest. "That one is Robb's," he lies, gesturing to one of the pups that squirm in his sister's arms.

Sansa sobs, and finally Jon stalks through the door, sick of their games. Sometimes he wishes his pretty red-haired half-sister would smarten up, but at the same time, he can't condone his other siblings' treatment of her.

"Enough," he says, using both his hands to smack his scheming brother and sister on the backs of their heads. Then he grabs one of the pups from Arya's arms by the scruff of its neck and holds it out to Sansa. Her eyes widen, and she grabs the female puppy from his outstretched hand. Her lips part in awe as she cradles the tiny creature in her arms, looking down into its eyes, still blue with youth but soon to turn amber.

"She's yours," he says gently, ignoring Arya's whine from behind him. "Name her, train her, feed her. Treat her kindly, and firmly." He puts a hand on her elbow, and looks down into her eyes. "And next time your gut tells you something isn't true, believe it."

She nods hastily. "Thank you, Jon," she says quietly.

"You're welcome," he says briskly. "Now go settle her into your rooms and get ready for supper. You can't bring her to the great hall with you, and your lady mother won't be happy if you're late." She nods and instantly turns, clutching her new puppy to her chest and walking back across the square.

He turns, his own puppy stumbling around his ankles, and crosses his arms, frowning at his other younger siblings. "You three," he says sternly as Rickon walks sheepishly from the tack room, "are menaces."

"Not our fault Sansa's stupid," Arya says meanly, putting down her direwolf and crossing her arms in return.

"Sansa isn't stupid," he says harshly. His wild little sister has the good grace to wilt a bit under his stare. "She's gullible. And she's generally not unkind, which is more than I can say for the lot of you, at the moment."

The three of them shift their feet.

Jon cannot help the smile that jumps to his face, and he shakes his head in amusement. "Get going, all of you," he says. He shoos them off, and they all run, giggling, direwolf pups yipping and stumbling along at their heels.

He reaches down and scoops the pale puppy at his feet up into his arms. "What shall we name you, then?" The runt leans up and licks him on the nose, and Jon clears his throat. "Well, you're as pale as a ghost," he mumbles. He smiles softly. "Seems fitting, doesn't it?"

The wolf does not answer, just snuggles into the crook of Jon's arm. He sighs. It is nearly time for dinner, and even though Lady Catelyn won't care if _he's_ late – in fact, she might prefer that he not show up at all – Father will surely notice.

Later, at dinner, Sansa catches his eye across the hall. He holds her gaze for a moment; then, strangely, she flushes, and looks hurriedly away.

He does not let himself think anything of it.

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"You're going to the Wall."

Jon turns. Sansa swallows, folding her hands together in front of her stomach. "Yes," he says, his eyes dark and soft with something she can't quite identify.

She nods. "That's…good," she says lamely. "It'll be a good fit for you." She does not say _because you're a bastard,_ because that would be rude. But she can't help but feel guilty, because she knows he hears it anyway, and even though it isn't her problem – it has never been her problem – she can't help but feel, for the first time ever, that somehow it just _is._

His nostrils flare, and he looks back to his horse, lifting the flap of his saddle to adjust the girth. She watches his bicep bulge when he yanks on the strap, sliding the buckle up to tighten it; she is just old enough to be aware of such things, and belatedly she realizes that her older half-brother is attractive. His mare shifts on her hooves, snorting softly.

"I'm going to King's Landing," she says, feeling awkward and, for some unexplained reason, angry. "To marry Joffrey. I'm going to be queen." She raises her chin with pride.

He sighs, and pats his horse on the rump. He looks at her, and his eyes are no longer soft, but hard and hot and unreadable. "I'm sure it will be everything you hope for," he says quietly. "I'm sure you'll have every bit of happiness that songs always promise to beautiful young ladies."

She is not the smartest girl – she knows that her gifts lay elsewhere – but she is savvy enough to know that he is mocking her, somehow. "Of course I will," she says hotly, her eyes narrowing to slits. "King's Landing is where I belong! I'm betrothed to Joffrey Baratheon. I'm going to be _queen._ Of _course_ I'll be happy!"

She realizes too late that she sounds petulant, childish. She expects him to roll his eyes, grin, laugh at her. He does none of these things, because he is not Robb, or Bran, or Theon – he is Jon Snow, her bastard half-brother, and even at sixteen he is more honorable than anyone else she knows besides her father.

Therefore it makes her even angrier when he only smiles sadly at her and says, "Of course you will be, Sansa. Of course."

Then he tucks a stray piece of hair behind her ear, and her breath catches as he leads his horse away. It almost occurs to her to cry, but she is distracted by the prince, who cuts an impressive figure prancing across the yard on his bay stallion.

She tamps down the voice in her head that points out that he is not as good a horseman as Jon is.

Only later, when she watches through the carriage window as her bastard brother's horse peels away from the convoy to ride north with Uncle Benjen and The Imp, is she shocked into crying. Because she suddenly realizes that she may never see him again – and if she does, it will be years from now.

She is not sure why it makes her so sad. She has never really counted Jon as a brother – at least, not as she does Robb and Bran and Rickon. Hastily, so that her mother and Arya and the queen and Myrcella do not ask too many questions, she stabs herself in the finger with her needle to give her tears an excuse to fall. Her mother chides her softly, and Sansa stares down at the bead of blood that wells on the pad of her finger.

It is the same color red as Ghost's eyes. Realizing this only makes her cry harder.

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 **Please review if you feel so inclined! The next chapter will be posted on Saturday or Sunday.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Just a quick reminder: the characters that I use for my GOT stories are the ones that are portrayed on the show. I've never read the books. That's why I list mine under the Game of Thrones category, rather than ASOIAF. So try to remember that while reading. In the show we don't get the same details as we do in the book, so my knowledge of the characters is limited to what I see on screen, and how I interpret it.**

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 _Born the bastard of Winterfell…now the Lord Commander of the Night's Watch._

Sansa shivers, her hands trembling as she struggles to focus on her needlework. _Lord Commander of the Night's Watch._ Jon is alive—and not just alive, but at the Wall, less than two weeks away on horseback. And not just alive and at the Wall—but _in a position of power._ In a position where he could help her, keep her safe, protect her; at least as much as anyone can protect anyone, these days. He is in charge at Castle Black, which has a gate, and walls, and is so far north and so cold that no one would want to seek her out there.

Jon. Gods, what she would give to see Jon again. She hasn't thought about him in some time—had just assumed he was dead, like the rest of her family, and therefore had shoved him from her mind as thoroughly as she'd been able. She thinks of the last time she saw him, cantering away from her on the back of his horse as his cloak billowed behind him.

She wonders how he is. She wonders what the last five years have been like for him, wonders how he has managed to become Lord Commander of the Night's Watch even though he is just a bastard.

 _Just a bastard?_ she thinks. _More than that, now. So much more._

He has always been more than that, if she's being honest. He has always been the best of them, the most honest, the most honorable, the most moral. He is more worthy of the name _Stark_ than she is, now. He always has been.

She pricks her thumb with the needle and hisses. The dress she is mending—torn by Ramsay only the night before—falls from her lap and flutters to the floor. She glances down at it, and then looks at her hurt thumb. She watches numbly as a thin rivulet of blood slides down her palm to her bruised wrist before it separates from her skin and drips onto her bare foot.

She stares at it. She watches silently as it begins to dry, adding another bright color to the already mottled skin of her foot. She is always bright, now—her bruises and cuts add a multitude of colors to the ginger of her hair and the moonlight of her skin and the coolness of her eyes and the pinkness of her cheeks. Now she is not only orange and white and blue and peach, but also purple and green and yellow and red.

 _So many beautiful colors,_ Ramsay would say. _I do love colors._

She used to love color, too. Now she longs for black and white; longs for the starkness of Castle Black, all ice and snow and stone and wood, and longs for Jon, all ivory skin and inky eyes and curly hair the color of a raven's wings.

 _I will find him,_ she vows silently, reaching down to pick her dress back up. _I will escape, somehow, and I will make my way north to be by his side._ She swallows, and her hands go back to her sewing. _I will not fail. I_ **cannot** _fail._

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"They killed me, Edd—my own brothers! You want me to stay here after that?"

The horn sounds, and it only makes him angrier—who could possibly be at the gates, anyway? Who would ever seek to come here, to Castle Black, where men assassinate their own Lord Commanders? It is nothing but ice, snow, and bitter betrayal.

He strides impatiently to the door, and Edd follows—always follows. He hesitates, wanting Edd to go first, because he isn't Lord Commander anymore, doesn't _want_ to be Lord Commander anymore; but his friend does not pass him to open the door, and Jon has never been a patient man. Death hasn't changed that.

When he throws open the door and strides out onto the top of the stairs to look down into the square, the first thing he sees is a flash of red.

His first thought is of Tormund—but Tormund is standing off to the right, near the forge. His second thought is of Ygritte—but Ygritte is dead. His third thought is of Sansa, but his half-sister is even less likely to be here than _Ygritte_ is; because the last he'd heard, she had disappeared from King's Landing. She is rumored to be married to the young Lord Bolton, at Winterfell, but Jon suspects she is either wasting away in a cell beneath the Red Keep—or merely a pile of bones at the bottom of Blackwater Bay. He has very purposefully not allowed himself to think of the stunning girl he'd once called sister; just as he has not allowed himself to think of any of the members of his family since he'd let Sam and Grenn and Pyp talk him out of going to his brother all those years ago. He had left his old family behind and had gained a new one, and he had not permitted himself any nostalgia; he hadn't had time for nostalgia. He _still_ doesn't have time for nostalgia.

He looks down at the woman with the red braid—tall, slim, draped in a filthy brown frock and an equally drab cloak that beautiful, elegant Sansa wouldn't be caught _dead_ in. Still, there is something familiar about her. Foolish hope flares to life in his chest; he tamps it back down. Hope has no place in his life anymore. And then she turns towards him, and he steps back, his hands falling from the railing in shock.

He only looks at her. It is all he can manage, at the moment. Despite how she has physically changed, there is no denying it is Sansa. Even from across the yard, he knows the lines of her face, the tilt of her eyes, the texture of her hair.

He turns, and begins to descend the stairs. He prays he does not fall, because he can't look anywhere but at _her;_ his eyes are glued to her form. She turns towards him, her arms unfolding, her stance unsure. He wonders if she has the same fear he has: that it is a trick, a lie, that this isn't real.

When he nears her, he sees her more clearly. Dark shadows linger beneath her eyes. Her skin is pale, sallow, smudged with dirt. Her body is that of a woman now, her limbs no longer thin and coltish, but she does not stand as proudly as she once did—she hunches, her shoulders rounded and her head low as if someone is currently beating her across the back of the neck with a stick. Her lips are pale and chapped, and her eyes…

Her eyes are what have changed the most. They are the same color, but the similarities end there. They are full of pain, of bitterness, of fear, and of a horrible, sickening _knowing_ that Jon suspects is reflected in his own stare. It is the kind of knowing that one acquires with experience—the kind of knowing that one obtains when one learns the hardest lessons that life has to offer.

When he looks into those haunted eyes, he feels his heart shudder and crack.

They stand for a moment, staring at each other. Her mouth is parted, her gaze wide and terrified and yet hopeful. She looks at him as if he is all she has ever wanted, and he swallows.

Then her face crumples, and her breath hitches, and before he can speak she is running to him, and he opens his arms to catch her as she launches herself into his body in a way that the Sansa from his childhood would have called 'undignified.'

Her breath comes out short and fast against his ear as he holds her to him, feeling, for the first time in a long time, that something in the world is _right._ She is nearly as tall as he is, now, but he can tell by the way her body trembles against him that she is far too weak. Even through all her layers, he can feel her hipbones and her ribs press against him, and when his hand clutches at her back, he can feel the ridges of her spine through her dress.

He closes his eyes and rocks her from side to side, holding her off of her toes as her arms squeeze his neck with fading strength. Finally her hold weakens, and he lets her slide down his body to stand on the ground once more.

When he pulls back to look at her face, she start to shake. "Jon," she says breathlessly, tears streaming down her face as her nails dig into his neck. "J-hon—"

"I'm here," he says. The space behind his eyes aches. Her voice is cracked, broken, the voice of a woman who has been ruined. He strokes her hair, and she leans forward to rest her head against his shoulder, her breath coming in shuddering pants. "I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere."

He is conscious of the dozens of men who stand in the courtyard, watching them with curious eyes. He sighs. "Come on," he says quietly. "Let's get you inside."

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 **Next chapter will be up in 2 days. Thanks for reading!**

 **xoxo**

 **Giraffe :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**Enjoy!**

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When she sees him for the first time in over five years, she is surprised at how hard it hits her.

He is different, now, just as she is. His skin is scarred where it had been smooth before, hair pulled back to emphasize sharp cheekbones and a square jaw where before his face had sported the roundness of youth. His beard and mustache are full, replacing the sweet boyish facial hair she remembers from when she'd last seen him. His eyes are hard and bitter and haunted, a stark contrast to the wounded puppy gaze that had once accompanied his ever-present sulk. His shoulders are broad, his body hard with muscle, and he moves with a quiet confidence that he hadn't possessed before.

She expects him to be hesitant. She expects him to be awkward, distant, unsure. But he stares at her as if she is his entire world, and when she runs into his arms he catches her without a second thought and holds her close. And finally she feels safe—finally she feels as if she is home. Winterfell is not home, anymore; the circle of Jon's arms is home.

His voice, when he speaks, is the only thing about him that has remained the same. It is quiet, deep, gravelly, his accent just as strong as it has always been. It is a soothing balm against her frayed nerves, and she feels an unfamiliar calm steal over her and goes boneless in his hold.

She eats first, along with Podrick and Brienne. They sit in the Lord Commander's antechamber. Jon bustles around in the bedroom, pouring hot water for a bath. Then when they are finished, they leave her alone in the bedroom, Jon giving her one last look before he closes the door to give her privacy.

She is grateful Brienne does not insist on staying in the room with her. She doesn't want anyone to see her like this. It has been eight days since Ramsay last laid his filthy hands on her (they had ridden through most nights all the way to Castle Black, rarely stopping for anything for fear of being caught up to), but the evidence of his abuse is still plain to see on her body. He had never allowed her bruises to heal before giving her new ones, so they go deep, layered across her body, punctuated by the little half-healed incisions that litter her skin. The flesh of her back is still healing from where he'd whipped her, the skin around the lash marks tight and delicate and liable to split back open if she moves too carelessly. He'd whipped her feet, too, and they have healed even slower, because she has been riding and standing and walking for days, never stopping to take her boots and stockings off. They are swollen and bloody and bruised, and when she steps into the water she has to bite her lip to keep herself from crying out in misery.

She cannot keep the tears from falling when her bottom hits the water, though she manages to stay silent. Both of her nether passages are sore beyond reckoning, and she pulls her knees up to her chest and presses her cheek to her legs as flashes of memory invade her mind. She sobs, squeezing her eyes shut as she struggles to push the feeling of Ramsay shoving himself inside her to the back of her mind.

Looking down at the cuts on her body, she wonders how badly they will scar. _I will never be beautiful again,_ she thinks to herself.

It is a relief. Beautiful women make for more obvious targets to men who like to hurt people.

She washes her hair as best she can, feeling the grime from her journey lifting from her person to float in the water around her. She only wishes the grime of her marriage would wash away with it.

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"I want you to help me," she says, "but I'll do it myself if I have to."

Jon does not answer right away—his jaw tightens as his brain tries to wrap around this new side of Sansa that has just presented itself to him.

His nostrils flare. "Let me think about it, and talk to some people." He sighs. "Perhaps we can figure something out." He is not confident.

She nods, eyes flashing in poorly hidden disappointment. He notices a fine sheen of perspiration on her brow, and frowns. He brings a hand up to her forehead. She burns.

"Sansa, you've got a fever," he says worriedly. He sits her back down on the stool she'd vacated.

She shrugs, looking uncomfortable. "It's nothing," she says. He almost believes her.

He narrows his eyes. "It's not nothing. What's going on?"

"It's just an infection," she says, her lip trembling. "It's not a big deal."

"Have you seen a maester for it?" he asks, his eyes tracing her form, noticing the way she hunches in on herself, as if fending off blows.

And that is when it occurs to him.

He remembers a woman at Winterfell—the candle maker's wife. She had always walked around like this: defeated, dejected, afraid. It had been common knowledge that her husband was a drunk. A mean drunk.

"Sansa," he says gently. He kneels down by her legs, and grabs one of the hands in her lap with his own. "What's going on?"

She does not meet his eyes. "It's fine, Jon, just a scratch—"

"Let me see, then."

She shakes her head stubbornly.

"Sansa," he says, his tone becoming stern and impatient. The firelight casts shadows on her face—she looks tired. "Not treating an infection can be dangerous. _Let me see."_

She swallows, and then her eyes fall to the floor. She bends at the waist, and he shifts backwards to give her room, suddenly uncomfortable with the proximity of her face to his. He doesn't know why it bothers him—and he does not care to think about it.

She begins to tug off her boot, and his hands jump up to help of their own volition. When her fingers pick at her stocking, she pauses, and finally meets his eyes. What he sees there breaks his heart.

"Please," she says, her voice thick. "Please don't ask questions."

He narrows his eyes, confused. And then she pulls off her sock, and he closes his eyes and leans forward to hold his face in his hand.

He wants to ask her what happened. He wants to rage, scream, punch something. Her foot is swollen, purple, the sole covered in half-healed lash marks. There is one that wraps around her heel and ankle, and the edges have darkened alarmingly.

He wants to question, but he doesn't, because she's asked him not to. Instead he lifts his head from his hand and looks up at her, heartbroken.

"Are there any others?" he croaks out.

She swallows, and nods. He stands, and absently runs a hand over her hair. "Stay here. I'm going to fetch a maester."

"No!" she blurts out, snatching his hand with her own. He looks at her in shock, and she drops it hastily. She releases a shaky breath. "No," she repeats, gentler this time. "I don't want anyone to see. Jon, I don't want anyone to _see—"_

Her voice breaks, and her hands slide around the backs of his knees as she lays her forehead on his stomach. She is trembling, and he is at a loss for what to do. He is not used to playing the role of comforter. So he puts a hand on the back of her head, cards his fingers through her unbound hair in a way that might not be entirely appropriate for their relationship.

They are not close. They have never been close. But they are all that's left, and she is leaning on him, depending upon him, and he cannot bring himself to pull away—figuratively or literally. She has reached out to him, and he realizes that she has no one else, besides Brienne; and Brienne of Tarth is probably worse at comforting others than Jon is.

"If you're…" He clears his throat, tampering down his rage. He feels helpless. "If you're hurt, you need to be treated," he says softly. "Infections kill people, Sansa."

She nods against his abdomen. "I just don't want anyone to see," she murmurs, her voice muffled against the leather of his jerkin. She pulls her head back and looks up at him. "I don't want _you_ to see." She swallows, and her eyes are pleading, fearful. "But I trust you. Promise you won't tell anyone?"

He exhales heavily through his nostrils. "I promise." He combs his fingers down through her hair, the silky strands damp and cool and impossibly soft against his callused palm. "I'm going to go get the medical kit," he says, pulling back from her. "I'll be discrete."

When he comes back, she has left the antechamber for the bedroom, and she sits on the padded bench in front of his bed. He makes sure both the outer and the inner doors are locked and bolted. Both of her boots and stockings are off, now, and the cloak that had been around her shoulders lays discarded on a chair in the corner. He pulls the chair up to face her, and sits in it, opening the maester's case and pulling out supplies. Wine to sterilize, salve to heal, bandages to protect. He pulls out what he needs, setting them next to the bowl of warm water on the floor.

Her hands fiddle with the laces at her collar, and he notices how they tremble. He reaches forward and envelops them in his own, running his thumbs across the smooth skin of the backs of her hands. She meets his eyes; her cerulean stare is full of shame, and he wishes desperately that he could wipe it away.

"Trust me, Sansa," he says quietly.

"I do, Jon," she says evenly. She squeezes his fingers. "I do."

She shifts, and he lets go of her hands. She begins to tug at the laces of her dress. He clears his throat, shifting uncomfortably in his chair. "Are you sure you wouldn't rather have Brienne—"

"No," she says, her head snapping up to look at him, her hands pausing in their ministrations. "I…I _can't,_ Jon. I don't want anyone to know—" She swallows, and casts her eyes to the ground, her fingers once again pulling at the ties of her clothing. "I don't want anyone to know what he did to me. I don't want people to look at me differently. Like—like I'm damaged." She widens the neckline of her dress, and he sees the first bruise.

Then she stands, and turns her back to him. She pulls her hair over one shoulder, and he takes the hint and reaches up to pluck at the laces on the back of her dress. His hands shake with rage as the milk-white skin of her back is revealed to him, the once smooth flesh marred with long gashes. Some are more healed than others: some little more than scars, some scabby and dark, some raw and moist and pink.

Her dress flutters to the floor. His eyes slide down her back and over her buttocks to land on her shapely calves. He distances himself emotionally; she is his sister. Even if she is only his half-sister—to feel desire for her would bring him shame deeper than he can imagine.

Best not let himself go there.

She shivers, and he strides over to the fire, stoking the coals and adding another piece of wood. When he turns back towards her, she is facing him, her eyes cast down to the floor as she wrings her hands together in front of her bare stomach. He does not allow himself to focus on her body, on the fullness of her breasts or the gentle swell of her hips—instead his eyes jump from bruise to bruise, cut to cut.

"Sit," he commands softly. "Did you wash with soap during your bath earlier?" he asked, his voice harsher than he means it to be.

She nods. "You don't have to do this, you know," she says. Her voice is thick with shame. "I can reach most of them by myself."

He pauses. "I'll take care of your back and feet, at least," he says, his voice softer. "Then you can do the rest."

She nods in acquiescence. She still will not meet his eyes. His nostrils flare.

"Look at me," he orders gently. Reluctantly, her face tilts up and her gaze travels from his boots to his eyes. "You have nothing to be ashamed of, do you understand?" he says, trying in vain to control the seething rage in his tone.

She sits down as he has commanded, and he moves towards her, crouching down to fish the cloth out of the bowl of water. He wrings it out, imagining that it is Ramsay Bolton's neck instead. "You're the most beautiful woman in Westeros," he mutters angrily. "All the evil men in the world won't change that."

He thinks he sees the shadow of a smile twitch at the corners of her lips, but her eyes remain solemn and haunted.

He puts a gentle pressure on her knee, and she twists on the bench so that he can sit next to her and attend to her back. He uses the warm cloth to wipe away any sweat and puss and blood that has gathered since her bath earlier, and then soaks a separate cloth in the wine and presses it as gently as he can to one of the wicked slashes across her shoulder blades.

Her body jerks violently, and she groans softly, leaning forward and digging her fingernails into her palms.

"I'm sorry," he says tenderly. "I know it hurts."

"I'll be okay," she responds softly.

"Yes," he says with a certain nod. "You will. You're stronger than you know."

They are silent after that—no amount of idle chatter will make this less awkward and painful that it already is. Awkward because brothers don't generally see their sisters undressed, and painful because he knows how much it hurts to have wounds treated—almost as much as getting the wounds to begin with.

When he is done with her back, he takes care of her feet. He fans the ointment until it dries enough to bandage, and as he wraps fabric around her whipped feet she dabs at the rest of her body with the alcohol-soaked cloth. He notices a nasty bite mark beneath her left breast, and he stands abruptly, spearing his fingers into his hair and turning away from her.

"Jon?" Her voice is soft, quiet, hesitant.

"I'm going to kill him," he blurts out. "Slowly." His voice is rough with emotion that he cannot control. Ever since Melisandre had brought him back, he's had a harder time reigning in his impulses; there is something wild within him now, something dark—something that had attached itself to his soul as he'd laid dead on a table, his consciousness floating around in a great black abyss.

"I'm going to carve him up little by little," he continues, staring into the fire. "Piece by piece. I'll make it take hours—days."

He hears the rustling of fabric behind him, and then he turns as she limps towards him, creamy, bruised skin covered once more in dark blue fabric. "I'm not sure you have that kind of torture in you, Jon Snow," she says quietly. "You're too good for that." She pauses, and he looks into her eyes. "You always were the best of us."

He shakes his head. "I'm not good," he denies easily, thinking of the evil spark of desire he harbors for her. "I've done terrible things." He turns toward her fully, and brings his hands up to frame her face. "He hurt you," he whispers, feeling his tear ducts ache with unshed tears. "He hurt you, and I was here, completely useless." His nostrils flare. "I should have been there."

She leans forward and her arms wrap around his waist, her hands clasping together over his spine. She rests her head against the junction of his neck and shoulder. She smells like his soap—pine and rain and lye—and like the astringent sweetness of wine. His arms encircle her shoulders, conscious of her hurt back, and he presses his nose to her hair, breathing her in.

When he looks back on it later, he is able to pinpoint this moment as the time when everything starts to change between them.

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 **Thanks for reading! Love you guys!**

 **Giraffe :)**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4! Hooray.**

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He gives her his chambers to stay in (even though they are rightfully Edd's rooms, by now), and has a cot set up for Brienne in the antechamber until he can figure out more permanent accommodations. Castle Black has never really had women before, except for Gilly, and she had stayed in a tiny room close to the barracks. Such a room is not suitable for Sansa and her lady knight, and unfortunately there aren't many private places here. So he goes back to bunking with the rest of the men; he finds he doesn't mind.

Sansa spends her days sewing and reading and tending to the pretty grey mare they'd stolen from the Bolton soldiers, which she names Winter. Brienne and Pod are always trailing after her, unless they are practicing in the training yard. He discretely redresses her wounds every night, keeping a close eye on the infected cut on her ankle. Even after seventeen days away from Ramsay, her bruises still linger. He begins to wonder if they will ever go away; but eventually, to his great relief, they start to turn yellow, and her cuts continue to scab over.

Within two weeks of treatment, the infection disappears.

He has spent his time getting Castle Black in order, and pondering his potential war against the Boltons. He has done inventory, seen to the food larders, and talked with Davos and Tormund about strategy and the number of soldiers they might be able to squeeze from the Northern houses.

It is not encouraging.

Then he receives a letter from Ramsay Bolton himself, and it changes everything.

"You will watch as I skin them living—"

He cuts himself off, the air knocked from his lungs as scorching, unadulterated fury ignites in his bloodstream.

"Go on," his sister says, sitting across the table with a tragic sort of awareness shining from her eyes.

"It's just more of the same," he mutters, his voice low and rough with barely controlled rage.

She snatches the parchment from his fingers, and he looks on helplessly as her eyes scan the foul words on the page.

"You will watch as my soldiers take turns raping your sister," she says, her voice trembling only briefly. Hearing the words out loud only makes him angrier. "You will watch as my dogs devour your wild little brother—" Here she pauses, and takes a shuddering breath. "Then I will spring your eyes from their sockets and let my dogs do the rest. Come and see." She exhales. "Ramsay Bolton, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North."

His heart pounds out a terrible rhythm against his breastbone, and the blood that has been poisoned by death is a sickening noise in his ears. "Lord of Winterfell," he says darkly, "and Warden of the North."

"His father's dead," Sansa says, her arms crossed on the table, her eyes filled with resentment and cynicism and anger. "Ramsay killed him." She speaks with absolute conviction and, remembering what had been done to her, he knows that she is right. "And now he has Rickon."

His protest feels futile. "We don't know that—"

"Yes we do," she interrupts, her eyelids fluttering. Once again, there is no uncertainty in her voice.

Tension stretches between them, the air thick with anxiety. Tormund breaks the silence. "How many men does he have in his army?"

She frowns, and looks up at the ceiling. "I heard him say five thousand once, when he was talking about Stannis' attack."

Jon immediately turns to Tormund. He hesitates—he hates asking. But all he can think about is his little brother sitting in a cold, dark cell—and Sansa's ruined body. "How many do you have?"

"That can march and fight…" He pauses. "Two thousand. The rest are children and old people."

Jon casts his eyes down. It is not enough. He looks at his sister. She looks especially pretty today—somehow noticing it only serves to make his anger and disappointment worse.

Her face is hard, her eyes blazing with emotion. "You're the son of the last true Warden of the North," she says, her voice strong and even. "Northern families are loyal, they'll fight for you if you ask."

 _Yes, but I'm not a_ _ **Stark.**_ He stares down at the table. He has never felt so hopeless. He jolts when she reaches across the table, forcefully grabbing his hand, gripping it with cold, pale fingers.

"A _monster_ ," she says furiously, "has taken our _home_ and our _brother."_ She traps him in her angry stare. "We have to go back to Winterfell and save them both."

His eyes drop from her face. He thinks of the last time he'd seen Winterfell—of the last time he'd laid eyes on his little brother. He thinks of the free folk, and of trying to fight five thousand trained soldiers with two thousand wildlings. Of trying to fight mounted cavalry with infantry.

Maybe she is right, though. Maybe he can rally some of the noble houses to his cause. _Their_ cause. Perhaps there is still hope.

She squeezes his hand so hard it is almost painful. He looks back up at her, sees the desperation in her eyes and the determination etched into the lines of her lovely face.

He nods.

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It takes six days for them to prepare for their journey. She manages to finish the cloak she has made for him, and presents it to him in the courtyard as Podrick holds her horse.

"A new dress," he says lamely, gesturing to her as she approaches.

She smiles. The look in his eyes makes her uncomfortable—but it pleases her, somehow. Even if she can't quite identify it. "I made it myself. Do you like it?" She does not know why she asks. She does not know why she thinks he'll care.

"Yeah it's…" He clears his throat. "I like the wolf bit," he says awkwardly. His smile is tight.

"Good," she says, amused by his manner. "'Cause I made this," she continues, holding out the new cloak, "for you."

His eyebrows furrow, and he takes it from her, his gloved hand brushing her own.

"I made it like the one Father used to wear," she says, suddenly feeling nervous when he does not say anything. She shrugs, and feels a pang in her heart. "As near as I can remember."

He runs his finger over the wolf design in the leather strap. When he looks up at her, his expression is one of deep feeling. Gratefulness shines from his eyes. "Thank you, Sansa," he says softly.

She smiles, pleased. "You're welcome," she replies. Then she leaves him, striding over to her horse to avoid looking too closely at the strange gleam in his gaze.

She is not sure she wants to know what it means.

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It is just over an hour's ride to the wildling encampment. Brienne and Podrick are gone, having left their company a few miles back. She finds herself missing the comforting presence of the lady knight and her squire already; she hopes they stay safe.

They dismount, and Sansa observes her surroundings with watchful eyes, walking behind Jon as they make their way to the tent where the remaining wildling elders gather.

Jon and Tormund make a good team; together, they convince the free folk to help them. Davos says nothing and Sansa follows his example; it is not her place to speak here. As a legitimate Stark, she has standing with the Northern houses, but the wildlings don't recognize such things. They respect Jon because of his actions—because of the history that they share. It has nothing to do with the fact that noble blood runs through his veins.

One thing Sansa notices whilst Jon and the free folk talk is that wildling women seem to wander by every few seconds, their eyes glued hungrily to her half-brother as if he is the last piece of meat in winter. Their intentions are plain to see in their eyes.

She sweeps away her irrational, unexpected jealousy in favor of being amused.

"So, you must be the sister."

She turns to her left, and her eyes fall on a pair of women that sit by a fire, roasting some sort of fowl on a spit. One is stocky and blonde, the other black-haired and black-eyed, with skin just a shade darker than the snow.

She nods. "I'm Sansa Stark," she says, turning to face them fully. Jon is speaking in hushed tones to a tall brunette man, and Sansa senses it is private, so she diverts her attention.

"I'm Rosa," the brunette says, "this is Gridget." She holds out a wine skin; with only a moment's hesitation, Sansa takes it. She takes a tentative sip, and coughs, choking it down. Then she cocks her head, and takes another sip.

She doesn't know what it is, but it's strong, and different, and she likes it. It doesn't remind her of the fancy wines and meads of the South.

"This is good," she says, handing it back to the lovely wildling. "Thank you."

"Fermented goat's milk and rice wine," she says. "I'm impressed. Not many fancy ladies take to it."

Sansa smiles at her, unoffended. "Have you met many fancy ladies?" she asks, her tone teasing.

Rosa grins. "You have a point. Perhaps they aren't all soft."

Sansa shrugs. "Only most of them." She smiles bitterly. "I was once soft, too. I spent far too long in the South. But now I'm back in the North, and winter is coming, and there's no place for softness anymore."

"You've got that right." Her eyes flicker to Sansa's right, and she looks over her shoulder to see Jon look over at them briefly, still caught up in conversation with one of the elders. "A fine man, your brother."

Sansa smirks. "You all certainly seem to think so," she says with a raised eyebrow, gesturing to the two-dozen women that stare unabashedly at her half-brother.

Rosa and Gridget both chuckle. "Ever since Ygritte started bragging about his talented tongue, the free women have been after him like a pack of rabid wolves."

"I wouldn't mind a taste," Gridget says, her voice low and hoarse. She grins cheekily. "Lucky woman, Ygritte. Just look at him. Now _that's_ an arse worthy of sinking your teeth into."

"Who's Ygritte?" Sansa asks stupidly, feeling her cheeks flush as her body stirs unfamiliarly.

Rosa sighs. "Jon Snow's woman," she answers. "She died a while back. She was the envy of the free women, taking up with the prettiest boy in camp."

"Liked to rub it in our faces," Gridget grunts. "Can't say I miss that about her."

Sansa exhales in surprise. She hasn't really spared a thought for Jon's love life—she'd just assumed, as a man of the Night's Watch, that he'd never taken a woman. Now she cannot push the image of him with a lover from her mind, and she hates herself for it.

Just then Jon walks up, the icy ground crunching under his boots. "Stop corrupting my sister," he drawls amusedly, looking pointedly at Rosa and Gridget. "You're both bad influences."

Rosa scoffs, and flutters her eyelashes at Jon teasingly; he rolls his eyes. "Don't worry, Lord Commander," she says flirtatiously. "We were just letting her try the good stuff." She holds up the wine skin. "She likes it. A true Northerner, your sister. We'll make a wildling out of her yet." She winks at Sansa, who grins. It feels strange. She does not smile often, these days.

"Yeah, yeah," Jon says gruffly. He catches the wine skin deftly when she tosses it to him, and takes a long pull of it. He wipes his mouth inelegantly with the back of his gloved hand, and then tosses it back. "I don't believe it for a second." He shakes his head. "I'd stay and chat, but we've got things to do. Try to keep out of trouble."

Rosa stands and stretches, and walks past Jon with a wink. "Perhaps you should try trouble on sometime, Snow." Sansa's eyes widen when the pretty wildling smacks him on the arse. "I think it'd look good on you." Jon's eyes harden with irritation as Rosa walks by Sansa and gives her a familiar peck on the cheek. "But if you're not up for it, I bet I could talk your pretty sister into spending her nights in my tent."

"Rosa." Jon's tone is full of warning, his square jaw clenched tightly.

The brunette throws her hands up in the air in surrender. "Okay, okay," she says, her eyebrows flying into her hairline. "I'll leave off." She smirks at him, and then turns and strides away, swinging her hips as she goes.

Jon shakes his head. Sansa feels her cheeks burn. Gridget looks up at them from her spot lounging by the fire, idly turning the spit with the bird on it. "See you on the battlefield, King Crow," she says with a smile.

Jon nods. "Gridget," he says in acknowledgement. Then he is striding away, and Sansa shares one last look with the blonde before she follows her brother. She flushes again when Gridget winks at her suggestively.

"Nice to meet you, sweet Sansa," Gridget croons. "Come back any time."

Sansa smiles at her shakily, and then hurries to catch up to Jon, who is moving quickly back through the camp towards where they'd left their horses, either oblivious to or uncaring of the many female eyes that follow him.

"Are they all like that?" Sansa whispers to him. She grabs his elbow, forcing him to slow down—her feet are swelling in her boots.

He huffs out a laugh—she likes seeing him smile, she realizes. He has good teeth. "To different degrees," he answers. "I've never quite gotten used to it."

Ser Davos waits with the horses, kindly holding her mare for her to mount. Jon offers her his hands; she places her foot in the makeshift stirrup he provides with his interlocked fingers, and he helps hoist her up. Normally she would be able to mount perfectly fine on her own, but her body isn't healed enough to allow that, yet. She controls the muscles in her face so he doesn't read how painful it is for her to sit astride anything.

She watches as Jon swings onto his stallion's saddle. "Ready?" he asks. She nods, and they set back out to rejoin their group, riding west towards Bear Island.

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 **Once again, thanks for reading! Please review, if you have the time or inclination.**

 **xoxo**

 **Giraffe :)**


	5. Chapter 5

**Aaaand here's chapter 5.**

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"Stop scratching it."

Sansa sighs, looking up from her bowl of stew. They sit in his tent, just the two of them eating supper alone, as they have started to do more as of late. Slowly but surely they are becoming more comfortable with one another; still, there is a strange tension that keeps them from forming a true familial bond—like the one he had once had with Arya.

Then again, Sansa is not Arya. And Jon has always looked at her differently, even when they'd been children.

"It _itches,"_ she complains; she is aware of how whiny she sounds. She doesn't really care.

"Which means it's in the last stage of healing," Jon says, leaning towards her and slapping her hand away from her bare heel. It has been well over a month, now, and finally the bruises and cuts on her body are almost completely healed.

She scowls at him, but does as he commands and tries to ignore the almighty itch around the scab on her ankle.

"How's your back?" he asks, bringing his bowl up to his mouth to slurp down the last bit of broth. It is almost winter—it wouldn't do to waste food.

"Much better," she answers, giving him a small smile. "It will scar badly."

"Now we'll match," he says with a wry grin. The upturn of his mouth belies the murder in his eyes.

She huffs out a laugh; where years ago such a comment would have offended her, now it only amuses her. "I still haven't seen yours."

He grunts. "They're far uglier than yours will ever be, sweet sister," he says, taking a swig of his wine and looking down at the table. "They haven't really healed, and it's been over two months. I suspect they won't ever heal."

Sansa grimaces. "I'm sorry for what happened to you," she says, reaching over to grab his hand. "No matter how awful things got for me, at least I was always _alive."_

He squeezes her hand back, but does not respond. His eyes are glued to the table.

They sit like this for a while, and then she stands, withdrawing her hand from his with some regret. She likes his hands—they're rough, and strong, and his calluses scrape her skin.

They are nothing like Ramsay's hands.

"I'm going to retire," she says softly. She lays a gentle hand on his shoulder. In a moment of stupidity, she leans down and presses a kiss to his cheekbone. She lingers just a beat too long, and she realizes it when he stiffens. "Goodnight, Jon." She draws back, not meeting his eyes, and then moves towards the tent flap.

"Goodnight, Sansa."

His voice is soft and low, and there is something in his tone that makes her skin tingle. She stalks to her own tent just feet away from his, feeling strangely unsteady.

She lies awake for hours thinking about how his beard had felt against her cheek, how his shoulder had tensed under her hand. When she finally falls asleep, she does so with his scent still lingering in her nostrils.

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"If Ramsay wins, I'm not going back there alive."

Jon swallows, anger burning in his heart. Anger towards her, anger towards Bolton, anger towards the winter that is fast approaching. He is just angry in general.

"Do you understand me?"

A few years ago, he would have said she was being dramatic—she had always liked being the center of attention. Now, he knows better. Her eyes are calm but wary, her face smooth and serious. Still, he can see the spark of panic that glimmers in her gaze. He has become familiar with her expressions over the last few months, and is better at reading her. She is no longer a complete mystery to him; he is starting to unravel her, piece by beautiful piece.

He stares at her, his nostrils flaring. "I won't _ever,"_ he begins, his voice rough with emotion, "let him touch you again. I'll protect you, I promise."

For a moment he sees soft surprise in her eyes—surprise at the passion that she can no doubt hear in his voice. He is afraid that he has given something away. Then she blinks, and the moment is gone. The look on her face is one of weariness and cold disdain. It makes him feel small.

"No one can protect me," she responds, her voice dark and acidic and resentful. "No one can protect anyone."

Then she looks at him, her eyes full of pain and bitter realism, and leaves him standing alone in his tent. The wind howls ferociously outside; it echoes the howling of his soul.

Restless, he stands and walks off into the night.

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oooo

It is much later in the evening when Jon announces his presence at the entrance of her tent. She stutters out a hasty "come in," surprised that he would come to see her when they had parted so sourly only a few hours before.

He ducks between the flaps, turning to tie them tightly behind him. When he turns to face her, she notices how his eyes flicker briefly to the cleavage that her shift exposes. Then he clears his throat, and props his hip up on the table where she keeps her sewing supplies.

"I brought you something."

"Oh?" she says, keeping her voice light. She shrugs on a robe, sensing his discomfort, but leaves it untied—she does not know why.

He exhales heavily through his nose, staring down at the rug. Wordlessly, he hands her a bundle of cloth.

She unwraps it, curious. Inside there are four wrinkled leaves that look freshly picked, and a sheath with a small knife. She looks up at him, confused.

"Deadly nightshade," he says quietly. Finally, he meets her eyes. His gaze is so sad it makes her want to cry. "And the knife is tipped with juice from the roots. I found some down by the stream—miraculously still clinging to life."

Uninvited tears fill her eyes, and she blinks them away. She unsheathes the dagger—there is something sticky on the pointed end. Then she wraps the cloth back up and places it on the bed next to her.

"Thank you," she says softly. She is more grateful than he will ever know.

"Use both, if you can," he says gruffly. "The knife first, so it gets in your bloodstream fast." He steps forward, and her breath catches in her throat when he touches her neck. "Here," he says, pressing his fingers to her jugular, "or here." He brings his hand down to tap her wrist. "A prick is all it takes. Then eat the leaves—all of them, if you can." He exhales shakily. "That should do the trick. Nightshade works fast. Less than ten minutes." He swallows. "If you think you're about to be captured, don't hesitate."

She stands. When he steps back from her, she steps forward. They stand nearly eye-to-eye—he is no more than half an inch taller than her. He steps back again, his eyes flashing with awareness; once again, she pursues.

"Sansa," he says. His voice is full of warning, his eyes hard. "Don't."

She lifts her hands up to rest on his chest. "I just want to know," she murmurs softly, staring at his lips. "I might die tomorrow. I want to know, just once, what it feels like to kiss a man who doesn't want to hurt me."

He shudders at her words, his entire body heaving under her palms in a way that thrills her. It makes her feel powerful. "Sansa," he says harshly, his hands encircling her wrists. "I can't."

"Why not?" she asks, leaning forward to press her body into his.

"You know why," he says through clenched teeth.

 _You know why._ She does know. Because it is sinful, this thing that has grown between them—shameful beyond measure. Because if they cross this line, nothing will ever be the same again. Because they are tortured by their attraction to one another, but know that no amount of contact will bring them relief.

She looks up—the heat in his eyes is terrifying. Self-loathing simmers beneath its surface.

"Just once," she whispers, her lips just a hair's breadth from his. His breath comes out in harsh pants, and his body trembles. "I just want this one moment, Jon," she lies; she wants so much more than this one moment, but she is foolish for thinking that way. "I don't want to die never having kissed you." She swallows. "I would regret it even in death."

He says nothing; he does not encourage her, nor does he discourage her. His eyes are full of a horrible longing, though, and his body goes slack with surrender.

So she kisses him.

He is unresponsive at first but for the tightening of his grip around her wrists. Then she shudders as he angles his head and presses forward, and her lips open as easily as a flower in bloom.

He makes a soft noise in his throat. His lips move with practiced ease against her own, and pleasure shoots down her spine when his tongue touches hers.

Euphoria consumes her. A sudden and unfamiliar ache begins to develop in her womb, compounded by his hands letting go of her wrists to slip beneath her open robe and settle on her waist. She longs to feel them on her skin; longs to have his fingers pluck at the ties on her shift and push it down off her shoulders to pool on the floor.

His kisses are slow and languid and perfect. He is good at this—his experience is evident. His facial hair is soft against her skin. She slides her hands up to frame his jaw, reveling in the feeling; Ramsay's face had been smooth, except for the occasional stubble that had always irritated her skin during his forced kisses.

 _This,_ she thinks, her mind hazy with desire, _is how it should feel._ It is everything, everything, everything—the only thing that matters, the only thing that has _ever_ mattered. His body is lean and hard, the muscles in his arms tensing as his fingers flex against her waist. His skin is hot, almost feverish, damp from the cool, humid air outside. He tastes like cloves and wine, and smells like pine and leather and horses—earthy, solid, the smell of a man that has never been pampered by the finer things in life, never been spritzed with perfume or enjoyed the feel of silk against his skin. It is a drastic change from Joffrey, from Tyrion, from Petyr and Ramsay, and she finds herself ravenous, hungry for his taste and the feel of his rugged hands.

When Jon's hands grip her tighter and his teeth scrape her bottom lip, she mewls and presses her body forward—and the sound is what jolts him back to reality. His lips and hands are ripped abruptly from her body, and he steps back, leaving her bereft and cold.

His eyes reflect a horror that she does not feel. And suddenly she feels guilty for thrusting this choice upon him. He is breathing hard, and his face twists into a moue of regret.

"Get some sleep," he says harshly, licking swollen lips. Her eyes trace the movement, and his gaze darkens.

And then he makes a hasty exit edged with the jerky movements that usually accompany some level of panic, and she feels both exhilarated and alone.

She lies in discomfort for some time. Then her arousal fades, and she forces thoughts of their forbidden kiss from her mind. Finally, she is able to sleep, tormented by dreams.

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 **And so it begins.**

 **Thank you to those who read and review!**


	6. Chapter 6

**And chapter 6! Look at me go! (I'll be less excited when I get to chapter 9 and realize I have no more pre-written material. Oops.)**

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Watching her half-brother slam his fists violently into Ramsay's face is both heady and chilling.

Heady because she gets to watch her former tormentor's face bruised and bloody; chilling because she has never before seen Jon in action, and the power with which he moves is disquieting and unanticipated.

Jon is not a large man. He is of average height, of average build, with a lean body and good shoulders. But the force behind his punches is not proportionate to his size. It seems he has the strength of ten men, and he moves as quickly and as efficiently as a snake. His eyes are wild and deadly, and she realizes that he is going to kill Ramsay like this—pound away at his face until his brains lay scattered in the dirt.

She tells herself that now is not the time to acknowledge that the sight of his physical strength moves her to desire.

He reels back for another hit, and then sees her in his peripheral vision and freezes. His head turns slowly to look at her, and the violence fades from his eyes. He meets her gaze, and his body quakes, his fist poised in the air for another brutal strike; then he sits back on his heels, his chest heaving, and his face and eyes reflect only weariness. He gets up and strides away, back out through the gates to do who knows what.

Standing there, she wonders why he hadn't just finished the job. Killing a man with his bare fists would make him even more of a legend in the eyes of his men (they are already whispering about how he had stood in the face of Bolton's army and had drawn his sword, brave and alone; they are already whispering about how he'd taken three arrows to his shield without breaking his arm or pausing in trepidation; they have been whispering for a while about how he'd died and been brought back to life; they are still whispering about him becoming Lord Commander, and slaying dozens of men at the Battle of Castle Black, and killing a Walker at Hardhome, and bringing thousands of former enemies south of the Wall). So, in lieu of further status and respect, had he stopped because he realizes that, as a leader, he is obligated to give Ramsay a fair execution?

No. She knows that is not it. As honorable as Jon is, she doesn't think that honor alone would be enough to drag him out of the fury of bloodlust.

He had stopped when he'd seen her. Had he been horrified with himself for letting her see such brutality? Had he wanted to protect her from it?

No, that is not it either. She knows on some level he doesn't quite understand just how much she has changed. But he had seen the state of her body after Ramsay's torture—he is the _only_ one who had seen it—and knows she had been there to witness the beheading of their father, and as a result he knows she is no stranger to violence, no stranger to the savagery of men.

She thinks, perhaps, that it is because he'd realized that it wouldn't be fair. He'd looked at her, and he'd recognized that it is not only for him to decide how Ramsay meets his end.

Unbidden, a smile stretches across her face.

* * *

oooo

He convinces himself that it had meant nothing.

When Sansa joins him up on the battlements as he watches Melisandre ride away, he shoves down the memory of her taste, how incredible her body had felt pressed up against his two nights before.

Sansa is his sister. And that is all she will ever be.

"I'm having the lord's chamber prepared for you," he begins gruffly, for lack of anything better to say.

She looks at him, confused. "Mother and Father's room?" She pauses. She is looking at him, but he cannot find it in himself to look back. "You should take it."

His answering smile is edged with bitterness. "I'm not a Stark," he says.

He can feel her eyes boring into his profile. "You are to me," she says forcefully.

The statement honors him. Sansa had always been the sibling that had accepted him the least, growing up—he knows that she had loved him, on some level, but she'd always referred to him as "their bastard half-brother." He imagines that they never would have been close, if they hadn't been thrust together under these circumstances.

Still, even as she says it with such feeling, such conviction, he doesn't believe it. He is twenty-two years old, now—and he finds he cannot usher the truth of his parentage away just because his half-sister accepts him. He will never be a Stark. And even though it is all he'd wished for growing up, he now finds himself less concerned with his last name than he had been before.

He knows Jon Snow. He isn't sure he could ever know himself as Jon Stark. He doesn't know what Jon Stark would do in certain situations, doesn't know how Jon Stark would form friendships, relationships, how he would navigate the increased responsibility of lordship. But he knows how Jon Snow handles such things, and he has become comfortable in his position.

Besides: if he shares Sansa's last name, he'll feel even worse for wanting her.

"You're the Lady of Winterfell," he says roughly. "You deserve it, we're standing here because of you." He sighs, staring at the tree line. "The battle was lost until the Knights of the Vale rode in. They came because of _you."_

She is silent. He thinks perhaps it is because she feels just as shameful and foolish as he does. While he'd recklessly charged into battle like a fool, concerned only with saving the brother whom Sansa had warned was practically dead already, she had been conspiring behind his back with the least trustworthy man in Westeros. And while her actions had saved them all, he still feels a kernel of bitterness rolling around in the bottom of his stomach.

"You told me Lord Baelish sold you to the Boltons," he says, breaking the silence. He feels his irrational wrath swell within him, feels the urge to grab Littlefinger by the neck and squeeze the life out of him.

"He did," she says.

"And you trust him?" he says, struggling to control the incredulity and slight disdain in his voice. He is sure he fails. He finally turns his head to look at her, and this time she is the one who stares out at the horizon.

"Only a fool would trust Littlefinger," she says acerbically; it is said in such a way that has him mourning her lost childhood. He stares at her profile, admiring the planes of her face.

Finally she turns and casts her eyes upon him, and the shame and regret that shine from those cerulean orbs are plain to see. "I should've told you about him," she says dolefully. "About the Knights of the Vale." She exhales. "I'm sorry."

The apology is heartfelt. It goes a long way towards alleviating the resentment in his soul—and when she holds his gaze, he instantly forgives her, and feels his irritation wash away just as the Boltons' filth is beginning to.

He moves towards her, and notices briefly how she leans forward. He hates this. He _hates_ this attraction that they share; hates how he knows that if he wanted to lift her skirts up right here on the roof and bury himself between her legs, she'd probably let him.

He'd thought that their kiss last night had been just a one time thing—that she'd merely wanted to know how it felt, in case she were to die. But he had seen the look in her eyes when he'd been pounding his fists into Ramsay's face; had seen the exhilaration, the savage pleasure, the blatant lust.

It disgusts him and thrills him in equal measure.

He looks into her eyes; his nostrils flare. "We need to trust each other," he says with quiet conviction. "We can't fight a war amongst ourselves—we have so many enemies now."

Then he reaches up and cups the side of her face, and pulls her head forward to press his lips to her forehead. Perhaps he forgets himself, and lingers for just a beat too long; and what he intends to be a brotherly kiss turns into something that only pulls the taut tension between them even tighter. He feels foolish afterwards, and so he turns and walks back towards the door.

"Jon," she calls after him. He turns—she is just barely smiling, and her eyes are warm. "A raven came from the Citadel." She pauses. "A _white_ raven." Suddenly the wind kicks up, and her vivid hair, the only bright color in this stark landscape of black and white, floats around her face, caressing her cheeks and neck in places he longs to explore with his tongue. She huffs out a sigh. "Winter is here."

He cannot help the way his face softens, or the smirk that curves on his lips. Her mouth quirks, and then they are sharing a grin—a private smile, one born of years of history. He looks up to the sky as snow falls softly around them.

"Well," he says, looking back at her, "Father always promised, didn't he?"

She smiles, and he nods, and then strides purposefully away, desperate to escape his own yearning for her.

Because Sansa is his sister, and that is all she'll ever be.

oooo

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 **Look out for chapter 7 in a couple of days! Once again, thanks for reading!**

 **xoxo**

 **Giraffe :)**


	7. Chapter 7

**Alrighty, here's chapter 7 for your enjoyment! (Warning: it's a bit steamy.)**

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oooo

"This is a good thing."

"A good thing?" Jon looks at her skeptically. "How is this a _good thing?"_

"Jon," Sansa says exasperatedly. "The people have made you King in the North; _you're good at it._ This is huge. You have united all of the Northern houses, and have started an uncertain alliance with the Vale. And you've integrated the wildlings."

" _We,"_ Jon counters roughly, feeling flustered. His fingers drum out an impatient beat on the table. _"We_ did those things. But you're probably better suited to the position than I am—I just don't _want_ it, Sansa." He says it desperately, truthfully. Today they had argued about how she had butted in during the meeting—how she had undercut his authority in front of all the Northern lords. It is hard enough to assert himself as king when he feels so unsure to begin with. He had thought about it for a long time afterwards, and had gone out to the Godswood to reflect.

And he'd come to the not-quite-startling conclusion that Sansa is right. And that she has a better mind for this sort of job.

"Then listen to me," she suggests quietly. He stares at her. "Listen to what I have to say. I know the Northern houses respect me, and I have family ties with the Vale, but they won't _follow_ me. At the end of the day, I'm still a woman. But if you truly think that I'm well suited to leadership, then don't brush my council aside as if it means nothing; like you did before the battle." She looks down at her shoes, and Jon feels his quick flash of shame dissipate as her pride visibly fades. She looks tired. "I do know _some_ things," she continues quietly, scuffing her slippers on the floor. "I've had the best teachers. Cersei, Tyrion, Margery, Ramsay, Littlefinger. Eventually I realized I had to smarten up to survive. So I did."

 _You know nothing, Jon Snow._ Ygritte's voice whispers softly in his mind. _I do know some things,_ he'd once said in response.

Perhaps he understands Sansa better than he'd thought.

"Alright," he says softly, bowing his head in acquiescence that he is not used to giving. "You're right. I'm shit at politics." He sighs, and his heart clenches. "I was stupid not to listen to you, before. I was arrogant. I underestimated my enemy, and I was so focused on planning the battle that I never stopped to consider the warnings you gave me. I knew he was a monster, but I didn't understand his way of thinking." He pauses. "I'm sorry, Sansa."

"That's alright," she says softly, reaching out to take his hand. Her fingers are impossibly soft; he condemns himself for wanting to feel them on his naked skin. "You didn't really have any reason to listen to me. As a child, I was a snotty brat. I certainly wasn't bright, and had a tendency to make things far more dramatic than they should have been. The last time you saw me was when I was trying to say goodbye but ended up sounding like a petulant arse. You weren't there to see me grow up. Just as I wasn't there to see you grow from a brooding, sulking teenager to a brooding, capable leader." He huffs out a laugh; it is too true for him to be offended. She gives him a tight smile. "I think it's been hard for both of us, trying to adjust to how we are now. I don't blame you for not hearing me. And I know that we won't always see eye-to-eye, and that I'm not always going to give perfect advice. But please, take it seriously. Take _me_ seriously."

He nods. He knows what his flaws are—he is impatient, hotheaded, sometimes impulsive, and occasionally gets trapped inside the walls of his own anger and passion, where his mind goes hazy and wild until he wakes up from it and realizes that he has cut down twenty men by himself or punched a man's face into a bloody pulp.

Sansa is none of these things. She gets angry and passionate, but she holds those feelings inside her until she can do them justice with carefully controlled words. She is not impulsive, she is not hotheaded, and she has unexpectedly turned into one of the most patient people he knows. And the thought of her participating in any sort of violence makes him want to chuckle with its absurdity.

They sit there for a while, and he absently rubs his thumb over the back of her knuckles, lost in memories of their past. Finally she stands and slips her hand from his grasp. He misses its warmth. She leans down and pecks him quickly on the cheek, and then exits his quarters, the soft click of the door the only sound.

He is torn between relief at her departure, and longing to have her back. Angry at the turbulent emotions she always manages to stir in him, he stands abruptly, takes off his boots, strips down to his trousers, and wrings out the cloth in the washbasin to run it over his torso.

He stares down at his scars, remembering the night he got them. He chokes on his own breath as the sensation of cold steel suddenly sliding between his ribs overtakes him. He sits on the edge of the bed, leaning down to hold his head in his hands.

Belatedly, he wonders what Sansa would say if she were to see his shredded torso.

He laughs bitterly. What indeed? Would she feel pity, horror, fury? Would she be disgusted by them—appalled by how raw and fresh they look?

He decides it doesn't matter. She will never see him without clothing. He will not encourage this attraction she has for him; he struggles enough with his own. She is good at controlling her facial expressions, but her eyes and her body language are just as telling. And with time spent together in public, just as brother and sister, it will eventually fade.

That is what he tells himself, anyway. He only half believes it.

He stands once more, and finishes up with the cloth just as his door bursts open.

He whirls around, his hand going for the sword that isn't at his hip anymore. He only grasps air; Longclaw is propped up in the corner. But as he looks at his sister, his anxiety fades to a different kind.

Her face is flushed. "What's wrong?" he asks, alarmed.

She closes the door behind her, and his eyes flicker down to her hand as she turns the lock and slides the bolt so that they are locked in. Suddenly his heart beats a thousand times a second, and something evil slithers into his brain, prowling around the edges of his mind like some sort of foul, manipulative predator.

"Look me in the eye," she says, stalking towards him on bare feet. She stops in front of him. "Look me in the eye and tell me you don't want me."

His eyes snap to hers in shock. His body trembles, and something forbidden tightens in his abdomen. His eyes rove her face, looking for any trace of trickery, deceit, jest. There is nothing but raw emotion, like something has scraped away at her soul until the bare bones beneath are revealed.

"I…" He swallows. It is the only noise he can make, the only word he can speak.

"If you don't," she continues softly, "then I'll walk away. I'll walk away, and bury my feelings for you under a thick layer of sisterly affection. I'll never bring it up again, never allow myself to show jealousy when you take another woman. I'll never touch you again." She exhales. "But I can spot a liar a mile away, Jon Snow," she warns lowly, "and you aren't particularly good at it."

He flushes from head to toe, the fire in the hearth suddenly too hot. He can do nothing but stare at her; his horror at the situation wars violently with the feelings he has for her, and before either side can win she takes things into her own hands and leans up to press her lips to his.

And just like that, his control is yanked on so hard that it snaps and rebounds, slamming into his body like a whip.

She tastes just like he remembers—lemon cakes and wine. Her lips open against his in the second it takes for him to reciprocate, and suddenly his tongue is tangling with hers, his lips sipping at her mouth, desperate to taste more of her. His hands go to her neck, slipping under the waterfall of her hair to cradle her jaw, and she is so soft, so sweet, so perfect—

When one of her cold, velvety hands brushes over one of his scars, the jolt back to reality is jarring.

He reels backwards, and looks at her in horror. He sits heavily down on the bed as she stands before him, chest heaving and lips reddened from the attentions of his mouth.

"We can't," he spits out harshly, rubbing the scar over his chest out of habit.

"We can," she says, her eyes hot with determination and desire.

"We _shouldn't,"_ he corrects, insistent. This is not proper. This is not natural.

Then why does it feel so right? Why does it feel so inevitable, so easy?

"No," she says softly. Her hands go to the laces of her dress; he can hear the pounding of his blood in his ears. "We shouldn't."

"Sansa," he says, his voice rough with desire and shame. "I…" He closes his eyes. "I don't want you," he lies, gritting his teeth.

To his surprise, he hears her huff out a laugh, and he opens his eyes. Any uncertainty or sweetness is gone from her expression. Her smile drips with disdain, and her eyes hold no shortage of mockery.

"I think the deal I offered was that you look me in the eye when you say it," she drawls scornfully, her eyes no longer soft with feeling. They are hard and hot with passion and anger and a penetrating sort of desire that frightens him. Then her eyes flicker down to his lap; he realizes, to his utter disgrace, that his cock is harder than it ever has been in his life. "I don't believe you."

She steps closer to him, sliding her dress and smallclothes down her shoulders, and he panics. "This is wrong," he croaks out, his breath coming in harsh pants when her dress and shift fall to the floor. He does not quite have the self-control to not look at her; he grips the fur blanket on his bed with both hands until his knuckles turn white.

"It feels right," she whispers reaching out to touch his shoulder. His muscles spasm, and his lips part when she trails a finger down to one of the scars on his stomach. "It feels good." Her eyes slide up to trap his gaze with her own. "We both deserve to have something that feels good."

He swallows, and closes his eyes in torment when she moves forward to straddle his lap, lithe and graceful and beautiful and terrible. Her hands go to his shoulders, and then, with an inexperience that makes him shudder in delight, she rolls her hips and grinds her sex against his outrageous erection.

His hands instinctively go to the small of her back, and his eyes shoot open. Her eyes are focused on his, blue and green and everything in between. Her pupils are blown wide, and her lips part when, against his better judgment, he urges her hips forward once more. She cries out when her clit bumps against his pubic bone, the soft fabric of his pants providing friction against her womanhood.

He kisses her again—the first time that he has initiated it. She responds feverishly, her nails scraping over his shoulder blades and neck just hard enough to cause brief discomfort. He nips her lips in response, his hands flexing around her hips as he continues to teach her how to move against him.

When his lips move down to her chest, she sucks in a breath. Her breasts sit high, topped with rosy nipples that have pebbled in the cool air and hardened with her desire. He draws one into his mouth and gently rolls it against his teeth. Her movements become jerky and unsteady, and suddenly he puts his arms around her and flips her onto her back.

Her breath comes out in a sigh, but she freezes when he drags his lips and tongue down her stomach. His hands go to the crooks of her legs, and he pulls her to the edge of the bed and sinks down onto his knees, desperate to see her, taste her, touch her. She trembles with uncertainty when he nudges her legs apart and rests her calves on his shoulders. She props herself up on her elbows, her brow drawn down in consternation, and opens her mouth to speak.

Her first word turns into a squeak when he leans forward to lick a stripe up her slit. He closes his eyes—it has been a very long time since he's tasted a woman like this. She is impossibly wet, the evidence of her desire smeared across her inner thighs and shining from her sparse auburn curls. He spreads her nether lips open with his fingers, locates the little bud at the top of her slit with his questing tongue, and pulls it into his mouth.

She is more responsive than he expects. Her hips shoot off the bed and her thighs clamp involuntarily around his head, making his ears ring. He chuckles—then remembers all the reasons why this isn't funny, and his free hand grips her thigh a little harder than necessary. Still, the thought of the wrongness of what he is doing doesn't affect his actions in the least: he has lost himself within her, and knows that nothing short of a fire-breathing dragon will tear his lips away from her now. The state of his cock doesn't change, either—it strains against his pants, painful with how hard it is.

He will guarantee her fulfillment, at least. He refuses to use anything but his tongue to pleasure her. If his pants come off, it will be a disaster; with his luck, he would get her with child and everything would come crashing down around them.

It is a sobering thought.

It would be cruel to stop now, though—not when she is so close. Her legs start to tremble, and her fingers come down to knot in his hair, uncertain of whether to tug him forward or push him away. He ignores the light sting of his scalp. He has done this many times before. It is obvious that she has not. He is patient. He works her over with steady ministrations, pleased when her little whimpers turn into breathy moans.

He knows she is nearly there when one of her hands scrabbles at the fur blanket and the other tightens in his unbound hair. Her legs shake even more, and her hips shift, lifting off the bed when he intensifies his attentions.

Then she groans in rapture, squeezing her eyes shut and drawing her knees up to rest her feet on his shoulders as she flies apart. He works through her orgasm with gentle flicks of his tongue. Her juices are spread messily across his mouth and chin, and his jaw aches, but he would do it a thousand times over if only to see the look of ecstasy on her face.

But he will not do it a thousand times over. He will never do it again.

His body aches with the need for release, and no matter how many deep breaths he takes he cannot get his arousal to fade. He stands; his right knee pops as it has always done since he'd injured it at Craster's Keep.

Regretfully, he runs a hand over her heaving stomach, his rough fingers tracing over her milk-white skin. Despite the small white scars that litter her body, she is still as perfect as any woman has a right to be. And she has regained some of her pride—she stands taller, walks with purpose, meets any man's gaze no matter the situation. And she does not move to cover herself as she comes back down to earth. She feels no shame for their actions.

Lucky her.

"You regret it," she says suddenly, her voice hoarse. She opens her eyes to look at him, and he gets caught in her stare, as he is wont to do.

"Of course I do," he says, turning his anger inwards. Even anger can't tamp down his desire, apparently. He turns and goes over to the washbasin, grabbing the cloth and running it over his face.

"Why?" she asks. She sits up, her movements languid and graceful. Then she stands, and he averts his eyes. She walks over to him, and he has nowhere to escape to, nowhere to go where he can avoid her sultry stare.

When she gets to him, she puts her hands on his chest. He shudders, and forces himself to meet her gaze. He lifts his hands to cup her face, his heart twisting painfully inside his chest.

"This is an _illness_ , Sansa," he murmurs hoarsely. "We're sick with it; like Jaime and Cersei. It _has_ to stop."

She sucks in a breath. "We're not like them," she counters firmly.

"How?" he asks impatiently, smoothing his thumbs over her temples. "How are we not like them?"

"We're sane, for starters," Sansa snaps, her nostrils flaring and her eyes alight with ire and hunger. "And we aren't twins—we don't even share a mother."

He looks at her incredulously. "Alright," he says, his voice rising with his frustration. "Say we continue with this. What happens when somebody finds out? What happens when you get pregnant, and don't have a husband to explain it away, like Cersei had with Robert? We will lose _everything,_ Sansa." He shivers when she brings her hands lower, her fingers playing around his navel. "I can't hide the way I feel about you," he says lowly. "I can't hide the way I look at you. Someone will figure it out, if they haven't already. Ser Davos sometimes casts me strange looks."

"Ser Davos would never betray us by running his mouth," she says. She leans forward, and brushes her lips across his cheek. "Brienne would never betray us by running her mouth. Edd would never betray us by running his mouth. And Tormund would never betray us by running _his_ mouth—and wildlings don't care much about this stuff anyway, you've said so yourself."

His nostrils flare; she has a point. He wants it to be good enough; wants to be able to accept her words, wants to be able to come to her every night and lay her out naked on the bed and let her take her pleasure from his body—and let himself take his pleasure from hers.

But it is not that easy.

"And what about contraception?" he asks softly.

"Moon tea," she says hurriedly, her hands fluttering dangerously close to the laces of his trousers.

"And who is going to brew this moon tea for you?" he asks harshly. "Eventually someone will talk."

"I'll brew it myself," she says haughtily. "We have all the herbs we need in the greenhouses. I saw Maester Luwin brew it a thousand times for the women here—girls who'd accidentally gotten themselves in trouble. I know how to make it."

He catches her hands in his own, and closes his eyes. "I can't, Sansa. I just _can't."_

"You _won't,_ " she corrects, the coolness of her tone hiding the sadness beneath. He almost doesn't catch it.

"It's wrong!" he says, raising his voice in anger. "Seven hells, woman, it's just _wrong!"_

She nods, and moves away from him, reaching for her clothing. "Yes," she confirms quietly. "It is."

She bends to pull her dress up her body, and his eyes linger on her backside, his cock still straining within the confines of his trousers. Then she turns.

"It is wrong," she says. "But what is another wrong thing, in a wrong world? What's one wickedness compared to the filth of all the terrible people on this continent?"

She pauses. She swallows, and suddenly she looks vulnerable. "I've never felt any sort of bodily pleasure before you," she whispers. He stiffens, the reality of her statement rigging true. "At least now I know."

He closes his eyes, suddenly feeling guilty in a different way. He feels her lips brush ever so softly against his; he trembles, but does not kiss her back.

"Goodnight, Jon," she says quietly. Then he hears her cross the room, and the door clicks shut behind her.

He stands there with his eyes closed for some time. Eventually he strips off the rest of his clothes, his movements jerky and uncontrolled, and wraps his hand around his cock in a strangling grip. He takes care of his problem quickly.

He thinks about her as he does it.

Afterwards, he finally lies down on the bed. His shame settles on top of his body just as surely as a blanket would. Sansa's naked form flashes irritatingly behind his eyelids.

 _What is another wrong thing, in a wrong world? What's one wickedness compared to the filth of all the terrible people on this continent?_

Her parting words torment his mind—slide around in his head like poison. He lies there for hours, staring up at the ceiling, wishing she were there next to him.

Finally, he sleeps, and his dreams are dark with evil things: things that haunt him from beyond the grave.

oooo

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 **So? What do you think? Please review! Things get even steamier in the next chapter.**

 **Thanks for reading!**

 **Giraffe :)**


	8. Chapter 8

**Hello! Happy Thanksgiving, all! Here's chapter 8.**

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oooo

She has come to realize that it bothers him much more than it bothers her. It is because he is still good inside—still driven by honor, despite his experiences. She is no longer good inside; she wonders if she ever truly _was_ good. Regardless, now she is ugly. Still pretty on the outside, perhaps; but rotten, spoiled, like a piece of fruit fallen from a tree and gone soft inside.

She is ruined, and she has come to terms with it. Which is why she feels no guilt anymore when she desires him. On the list of bad things she has ever done—or that have been done to her—this is the least terrible.

She wonders why she wants him so feverishly. He is an attractive man, to be sure. He is powerful, both physically and mentally, and is a good leader, when he isn't letting his emotions or pride get the best of him. And he cares for her—sometimes he watches her, like he still can't quite believe she's real. He loves her, even though they were never close as children.

Yes, she wants him for all of these things. But she thinks it is because of what she sees in his eyes when they look at each other. The monstrous thing that shines from his black-brown-grey eyes reflects the monstrous thing within her. It is a connection born of darkness—born of a shared forbidden desire that steals away their self-control, piece by perishing piece.

It has been a week since their rendezvous in his bedroom, a week since she has felt his mouth on her body and at the junction of her legs. She had heard of such things, when she'd been in King's Landing. Girls had giggled about it in the corridors. Still, it is an uncommon practice; men rarely ever do things that aren't for their own pleasure. And now she knows why the wildling women are so rabid for him—because he not only performs such an act, but he is damned good at it.

Her nights are full of vivid dreams; she wakes up with moisture between her thighs, her heart pounding. She aches for him more than she has ever ached for anything else. Whenever she sees him in meetings or in the halls or at meals, her womb starts to burn so strongly that, going unfulfilled, it borders on painful. He looks like he suffers from the same affliction, his eyes blazing hot and his body going taut.

Still, sometimes in her dreams Ramsay's face will make an appearance, ruining everything. He still taints her on a deep level. She wonders if she can even be with a man without memories of Ramsay inside her.

One night, the nightmare is so bad that she falls out of bed and lands hard on the floor. Tears stream down her face. Shaking, she stands up and puts a robe on over her loose nightgown. She doesn't even think about shoes as she opens the door to her room and steps out into the hallway. She runs down the hall, her bare feet slapping on the frigid stone. Jon's chambers are only thirty paces from her own—she counts. When she gets closer, she runs into two patrolling guards.

"Lady Sansa," one says in surprise. She recognizes him as a lieutenant. "What's wrong?" He puts a hand on the knife at his belt; the other guard, who is unfamiliar to her, looks around with wary eyes.

"I'm fine, Charlus," she says with a teary smile. "Just had a bad dream. I'd like to talk to my brother."

The soldier nods, and moves his body to let her through. "Feel better, My Lady," he says kindly.

When she gets to his door, she knocks gently. She hears no answer; she opens the door anyway.

She wonders why he leaves his door unlocked. Even with how tight Winterfell is being guarded, it isn't safe. Then it comes to her: he doesn't want her to not be able to get in when she wants.

The thought sends a thrill of satisfaction down her spine.

She closes the door behind her, and locks it. When she looks to the bed, Jon is already sitting up, blinking sleep from his eyes. He looks at her warily; then he sees her face, and his eyes soften.

"Can I stay with you for a little while?" she asks tremulously. She is torn between her burning desire for him and the lingering feel of terror from her dream.

Wordlessly, he pulls back the covers next to him; his expression says that he thinks this is a bad idea, but he cannot turn her away—Jon's compassion will always get the best of him.

She shucks her robe, and he makes a tiny noise of protest in his throat. But she climbs into bed with him regardless, laying her head down on one of his pillows and pulling the covers up to her chest.

He keeps his distance; she wishes he wouldn't. "Nightmares?" he asks softly, looking up at the ceiling.

She nods. "It's fading," she says. "But I just needed to be near you. I never think about him, when I'm with you. You chase his memory away."

He sighs. He says nothing; then a minute later his hand moves down to catch her fingers with his own. They are nearly two feet away on the bed, and she desperately wishes they were closer.

But she will take what she can get. Closing her eyes, she drifts off to sleep, her hand warm in his.

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oooo

When she wakes up it is even darker outside, and she realizes that the fire has simmered down to glowing embers. She is not cold, though; she is lying on her left side, and Jon's chest is just inches from her back, his feet tangled with hers. It seems she is not the only one who doesn't like to wear socks to bed.

The thought amuses her, for some reason. Restless, she slides her body back until it is flush against his. Her breath catches in her throat when his impressive erection prods her in the arse.

Desire shoots through her body, wetness trickling down to pool between her legs. He is still asleep, she realizes as she plucks carefully at the two top laces at the neckline of her nightrail; but he stirs when she arches her back, pressing her backside more firmly against his trapped cock.

She feels the exact moment he wakens. She feigns sleep, and wickedness sinks its talons into her warped mind. He groans softly from behind her, no doubt realizing the situation he is in. When she feels him begin to pull back from her, she stretches, languidly lengthening her arms and arching her back and pointing her toes. Then she relaxes again, pillowing her head on her arm and curling her legs so that her calves and thighs are flush with his.

He freezes. His breath comes in harsh pants, edged with physical and mental pain. She feels him lay a hand on her hip, feels his body tremble. Then he slides his hand up and taps her gently on the waist.

"Sansa," he says, his voice husky. He shifts his hips backwards; she stirs, faking a slow awakening.

"Jon?" she asks groggily, her senses on high alert. She absently slides her arm down to trap his hand against her waist, just inches from her right breast. "What's wrong?" She turns her neck and shoulders, twisting her torso and making sure the tops of her breasts are visible in the dim light of the dying fire. Her nipples strain against the white fabric, their outlines obvious even in shadow.

His expression is one of abject torture. She adopts a moue of sleepy innocence, blinking up at him and wondering when she had become so unscrupulous.

 _I'm part of you now._

Ramsay's parting words echo in her mind, sliding around like acid. Perhaps he had been right. Perhaps some of the evil had fled from his soul upon his death and had latched onto hers. She is corrupt, foul on the inside, and her wickedness has brought out whatever latent impiety Jon has been harboring so secretly inside his heart.

Not so secret anymore.

"Nothing is wrong," he lies, his eyes flickering down to where his hand rests on her waist.

"Really?" she hums before he can come up with some explanation for "waking" her. "Because I swore I felt…" Like the siren she has become, she pushes her backside again his groin once again.

Her desire intensifies, and she hides the wicked smirk that longs to steal over her face when he chokes on his own breath. His hips jerk of their own accord, and she catches his hand in hers and drags it down her body to slip underneath the loose, knee-length skirts of her shift.

She grinds her hips back against him again just as she guides his hand up her leg to slip between her thighs. She shudders at the rough feel of his callused hand on her skin, and whimpers when his fingers brush her slit. He makes a noise in his throat when he finds her womanhood soaked with her arousal, his fingers becoming slippery with her juices.

"Please," she says. She's not too proud to beg; her pride lies on the floor next to her robe, temporarily discarded.

His breath comes in hot puffs against the back of her neck. She expects him to refuse, and prepares herself for his rejection. Then he shifts and parts her legs and slides his knee between her own to prop them open a few inches, and she melts in pleasure as his fingers go to work.

She is surprised and pleased when she feels no horror as he slides a digit inside her, followed by a second one. There are no flashbacks. But Jon is the furthest thing from Ramsay Bolton: his body is scarred, muscled, powerful, and his hands are deliciously rugged, rasping across her skin. His hair is unbound and curly, his beard trimmed neatly. And he smells like home, like nature, like sweat and pine trees and leather.

The rapacious beast within her wants more.

She lets him work her into a frenzy, and all she can think about is how she longs for the impressive bulge pressing against her buttocks, how she wants the thing between his legs buried between hers. So, aching with the need for release, she rolls and pushes him onto his back.

For a moment, he looks as if he is worried that he has hurt her; then she rolls her hips against him and the alarm fades from his face, his eyes darkening with both lust and simmering fury.

She does not attempt to go for the laces of his trousers yet—she doesn't want to scare him away. His hands fist in the sheets beneath him, his fingers still sticky with her essence. So she merely rocks her hips and undulates against his groin as she had done last week.

The groan that escapes from his lips is the sweetest music, and she brings her hands to his loose tunic, sliding them underneath to rest on the warm skin of his scarred chest. Every move she makes is calculated, slow, as if she is stalking a deer without spooking it. If she rips off his shirt as she longs to do, it will shock him back into reality.

She leans down to kiss him, and it is perfect, natural, as easy as if they've been doing it all their lives. He kisses her back, his mouth hot and insistent, but his hands remain clutching the bed covers in a white-knuckled grip. She scrapes her teeth against his bottom lip, and sits back up, her hands going to her nightgown.

"Don't—"

She does. She drags the hem up her body and whips it over her head, throwing it to the floor next to her robe and her pride and the shattered remnants of her conscience.

His eyes go first to her breasts, and then drop down to where her cunt rubs tantalizingly against his tortured manhood. Still, she does not move to touch it. She is patient. If there is one thing she has learned over the years, it is how to be patient.

In lieu of touching him, she touches herself. She feels exceptionally naughty and a bit foolish when she slides her hands up her stomach to cup her breasts, but the answering look on his face tells her she's doing everything right.

"I want to see you," she whispers, staring at him with hungry eyes.

He hesitates. Once again, something monstrous reflects in his gaze, and the devilish voice within her crows in triumph when he reaches down to pull his shirt over his head, his torso lifting up slightly and his hips flexing underneath her. Her breath catches.

His hands go back to lying on the bed at his sides, but she notices that they are shaking. She rolls her hips, chasing an orgasm that she can't seem to catch. She continues to touch herself, letting her head fall back and her eyes close as she tweaks her nipples harshly and enjoys it much more than she'd thought she would.

She wonders if she might like it rough. She wonders if Jon would do it right, bend her over the nearest flat surface and sink himself deep inside her, his hand fisted in her hair just enough to sting.

The idea of it is both terrifying and titillating.

Her eyes snap open and her head straightens when she finally feels his hand on her body. He pries one of her hands from her breast, and she huffs in surprise when he brings it down to the junction of her thighs. He grabs two of her fingers in his own, and presses them to the special place that he'd tormented with his tongue not so long ago.

The effect is instantaneous. She jolts as he guides her, the pads of her fingers pressing lightly against her, drawing circles around the sensitive bud. Eventually he lets go, and his hand goes back down to the bed, though this time his thumb rubs against her knee. There is a pleased look in his eye—a sinful sort of arrogance that she likes, that temporarily overshadows the kind, honest, noble part of him.

Her orgasm is more attainable, now; but it is still not enough. With each sound of pleasure, he seems to lose more control: his hips start to twitch, one hand tightens and loosens around the bedspread, the other smoothes over her calf, his mouth parts as he starts to pant.

She pulls her hand away, and leans forward to give him a scorching kiss. He loses himself in the feeling, his hands coming up to spear into her hair as he nips at her lips.

Yes—she thinks she might like it rough after all. At least with him.

While he is distracted, her hands sneak insidiously down to the laces of his pants. She lifts her hips, and her fingers make quick work of the strings. The fabric is soaked through with her own desire, and she pulls the edges apart and down enough to free his cock from its cruel prison.

He breaks away from her mouth to make a noise that is part protest, part eagerness. She chooses to dwell on the latter. She sits back, and grasps his erection in her hand. Anxiety floods through her—she has only ever been with Ramsay, and he had not been thick like this. But her yearning remains, and he strains his neck, turning his chin to the ceiling, his expression mirroring her feelings.

Then his hands go to her hips, and he slides her forward along the underside of his cock, releasing a tortured groan. Finally, he opens his eyes and tilts his head to look at her. His eyes are dark and hot and hard with something that she knows but cannot put a finger on; then he takes one hand and grips his straining member and guides it to her opening.

She tries to lower herself upon it, but he holds her hip in an iron grip. He grits his teeth and glares into her eyes.

"I'm going to all seven hells for this," he murmurs darkly.

For some reason, this makes her smile. She reaches down and pries his hand from her hip; he does not put up a fight, just slides it down to rest on her thigh.

"That's okay," she whispers. "At least then I won't be alone."

Then she puts her hands on his chest and sinks down onto him, and they are both lost.

She is so wet that he slides all the way in on the first thrust, despite his girth. He moans gutturally, and his eyes roll back.

She has never felt like this. There is a certain completion to be had, a fulfillment that she knows she will never be able to get anywhere else. He rolls his hips underneath her, and she lets out a surprised moan; she can feel the tip of him nudge against her womb in a way that borders on uncomfortable but is _so, so good._

"Sansa," he whispers softly. She looks down at him, quivering with such unfamiliar pleasure. He reaches up to cradle her jaw, running his thumbs over her cheeks. "I don't want to hurt you."

Her heart goes tender, some of the harsh immorality fading to make way for her love for him. She smiles down at him.

"You could never hurt me, Jon Snow," she says back. And as she says it, she knows it to be true. This is where she belongs: with him, safe in the circle of his arms.

She lifts herself off of him, using her hands on his chest for leverage. She whimpers on the withdrawal; then she descends once more, and his moan echoes her own.

She doesn't really know what she's doing. She starts to move against him, and the noises he makes tell her that she's doing _something_ right. Then his hands go to the meat of her hips, and he tilts them forward, and then guides her downwards in an undulating motion and pulls her back up. The second time he does it, she gets the gist, and soon she is moving on her own, his marvelous cock stroking deep within her as he caresses her body with his beautiful hands.

"Gods," he says, his voice rough like granite. "You're perfect."

There is something in his tone that gives her confidence; perhaps it is because he is telling the truth. Jon does not flatter just to flatter. He does not say things he doesn't mean. A few shards of her self-worth pick themselves up off the floor, where they have been laying the whole time next to her pride, conscience, and nightclothes.

Suddenly he lurches beneath her, sitting up a bit against the pillows so that his torso is slightly elevated. Then, with a gentle hand on the small of her back, he presses her forward in a quick motion that makes her pubic bone bump against his abdomen. Her clit hits his skin, and she knows then that it is all over.

She throws back her head and keens as he starts pulling her against him with more force, his movements languid and unhurried; their skin, slick with sweat and the evidence of their arousal, slaps wetly together in the quiet darkness of the room, and the noise only spurs on her desire. It is not rough, or fast, but it is _deep,_ and _thorough,_ and _filthy_ and _forbidden_ but somehow still _pure._ She puts her hands on his shoulders and leans against him as she struggles to get even more leverage to slam down against him harder. The tip of his member nudges a place within her that intensifies her pleasure ten-fold. She pants, her legs burning, and he senses she is close, his hands sliding up to rub insistently against her nipples.

"That's it," he encourages. "You're almost there." His voice is low and steady and smooth in a way that it usually isn't. She looks into his eyes, and only his monster is there looking back at her, dark and fatal and everything she shouldn't want _but does anyway._

This is her undoing. She flies apart atop him, bathed in ecstasy, and her channel spasms around his shaft in a way that has him groaning. She vaguely feels a hot wetness spread inside her, and the sensation sends her tingling nerves into overdrive. Dark spots fill her vision, and she slumps forward, her limbs twitching uncontrollably.

She lays her head down on his shoulder as they both come down from the heights of pleasure. She feels him soften inside her.

He runs his fingers over her back, making her shiver. Finally he clears his throat.

"We are never doing this again," he says lowly. She does not lift her head; she can tell by his voice that the monster has retreated back into its cave. "Never."

He seems to believe it.

She doesn't.

oooo

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 **Giraffe :)**


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